


Denials

by alessandralee



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-18
Updated: 2014-02-18
Packaged: 2018-01-12 23:31:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1204588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alessandralee/pseuds/alessandralee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first and last times Jemma Simmons told herself she did not have romantic feelings for Grant Ward.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Denials

If she’s honest with herself (and she doesn’t allow herself to be honest until nearly a year a later), it all started the day he jumped out of an airplane to save her.

It’s not because he saved her from certain death, although no one could have blamed her if it had been. It’s not even that he was prepared to follow her before he knew he could save her, something she doesn’t know about until Skye tells her a day later. It’s not those terrifying seconds before the parachute opens, the ones where he’s the only solid thing she has while the entire world spins by her. And it’s not their calm descent, the moment when she wakes up on his arms, or the boat ride back to shore, wrapped in blankets and a comfortable silence.

Nothing really changes, not in that way, until they’re already back in the air.

They’ve just been lectured by Agent Coulson, and Jemma’s trying so hard not to break under the weight of both his disappointment and terror she can’t forget.

“So what’d you think of your first time sky-diving?”

In all honestly, she’d thought of the impending impact of her body on the water’s surface, having to hurt her closest friend just so she could abandon him, all the questions her parents were going ask (and the answers they’d never receive). All of that in well under a minute.

“Honestly, I’d rather not think about it anymore.”

But she couldn’t escape it. For months, it was all that she could think about. She even dreamt about it, and woke up covered in sweat, her heart running a marathon in her chest. And whenever she had to act fast, an area she used to excel in, she could feel the wind crashing against her body. It took a long time be able to escape that terror.

“I thought what you did was incredibly brave.”

And then she’d confessed to him that never actually adjusted the Night Night Gun like he’d asked her to. He’s put his life on the line for her, and she didn’t even bother to make a small tweak to the weapon. He should have been angry with her for it.

“After all, I’m Agent Grant Ward, and just jumped out of a plane without a parachute and saved your life.”

And that’s when it began.

He’s already saved her life, and that was more than she could ever repay. But there he was, continuing above and beyond, lightening her load and offering a distraction, however brief, from the terror she could rarely catch a break from.

How could that not make her stomach flip-flop in a way not entirely dissimilar from plummeting towards the ground, but also infinitely more pleasurable?

She told herself it was just gratitude. Then she told herself that it was only logical that she’d form a connection to the man who saved her from death. She even told herself that this was yet another symptom of the trauma she’s endured. So she promised herself she wouldn’t dwell on it until she’d conquered the nightmares, and the way her mind and body froze when she was stressed, and her newfound fear of heights. By the time she’d overcome those, her confused brain would have moved on from whatever attraction it was projecting onto Grant Ward.

She only had to force her thoughts away from him for the time being. That she could do.

__________________

It all ends rather mundanely, to be honest (and she’s finally allowing herself to be honest). Or at least it’s mundane for two people in their line of work.

They’ve all made it safely back to the bus, and the cargo ramp is up being lifted when she notices it.

There’s a small rip in the shoulder of his black t-shirt, and Jemma can see flashes of deep red on his skin.

Blood.

“You’re bleeding,” she points out as she grabs his good arm and drags him towards the lab.

He grins sheepishly at her.

“Yes, I am. So please keep manhandling me.”

Her eyebrows jerk upwards and she mock glares at him.

“I was gently the first dozen times I had to stitch you up. I know you can handle it at this point. What did you do this time?”

“Bullet”

“Bullet in the shoulder. Excellent. Can you raise your arm high enough for me to pull this off?” she asks, fingers reaching towards the bottom hem of his shirt.

“Always trying to get me out of my clothes, Jemma. Can’t I get a little peace? I mean,” his voice drops to a whisper, “I’ve been shot.”

That earns him another glare.

“Fine, if you really need me to, I can lift my arms. But it’ll hurt and the shirt’s already ruined. Just cut it off.”

After directing him to take a seat on one of the lab benches, she does just that.

It’s a slow process, due to the fact that some of the blood has dried, caking the shirt onto his skin. She has to get a wet cloth and dampen the shirt enough to gently peel it off.

“Fucking hell,” he curses.

Gentle can only do so much.

“So when exactly did you get shot?” she asks him, as lines up a series of tools and supplies on a tray next to him. She’s studiously avoiding his bare chest, and she learned months ago that was the best way to avoid a flare up of her silly attachment to him.

He tells her that he’s not sure exactly when it happened, but she’s pretty sure that just means that he’s been running around like this for a while now.

She grabs some gauze and antiseptic and begins the slow process of clearing enough caked blood away to get a look at the bullet hole. Every time she presses against his skin, he winces and curses under his breath.

“I haven’t even cleaned you up enough to get a good look yet. I still have to remove the bullet.”

His face visibly pales at the thought.

“That’s what you get for being brave,” she tells him as she walks across the lab to one of the large industrial refrigerators. “You need to let me know as soon as you’re injured. The longer you wait, the more it hurts. And unfortunately, the sheer number of injuries you’ve sustained over the last month mean I no longer have any topical anesthetics. So you’ll have to make due with this sedative.”

He tries to protest, insisting that he can just suck the pain up, but Jemma remains insistent.

“It makes me job quite a bit easier if you’re not flinching every time I touch you.” 

She doesn’t add that touching him is enough of a problem to begin with.

It doesn’t take long for the sedative to take effect. She can see him visibly relax right before his eyes, the tension fading from his taut muscles.

Quickly and efficiently, she removes the bullet from his shoulder and thoroughly cleans out the wound. Then she neatly stitches it shut, and bandages him up. His eyes are still a bit glazed over when she announces that she’s done.

She’s putting away her equipment when she hears him speak up behind her.

“I just didn’t want to worry you.”

“I know.”

And she does. He’s spent nearly a year looking out for her wellbeing, both physically and emotionally. He knows how she worries each time someone on the team gets hurt.

She turns back to the cabinets that line the walls of the lab, but he’s not done talking you.

“You’re gorgeous, you know that.”

Actually, she didn’t. Or rather she didn’t know that he felt that way.

“That’s the sedative talking,” she makes the excuse for him. “I’ll page Coulson to take you back to your room. You can rest there.”

Jemma doesn’t allow herself to think about his words until Coulson and Fitz have removed him from the lab. She spends the rest of the evening reminding herself that he was loopy on sedatives when he said it. He probably didn’t mean it, and it’s likely he won’t remember it either. Which is good, because she doesn’t have romantic feelings for him, just platonic ones. And a purely professional respect for the symmetry of his form and how well he takes care of his body. But definitely not romantic feelings.

It’s nearly midnight when there’s a knock on her door.

“Who is it?” she asks, resting the book she’d been reading on her lap.

“Grant.”

“Oh.” She’s suddenly flustered. “Can it wait until morning? I was just about to go to bed.”

“Sure.”

She relaxes slightly.

“Just one thing.”

And tenses back up.

“About earlier, in the lab. What I said…”

She bites nervously on her lower lip.

“I meant what I said.”

Then she hears his footsteps head down the hall to his own bunk, at a much faster pace that he usual slow, confident gait. The door clicks shut behind him.

For the first time, Jemma admits her feelings to herself. Because there’s now a chance that he might feel the same way.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Day 1 of Ward x Simmons Ship Week on tumblr. The theme for the day was "firsts & lasts."


End file.
